Showing results by publisher "Random House Audio" in Sports & Outdoors

Every year on January 1, a quirky crowd of adventurers storms out across North America for a spectacularly competitive event called a Big Year: a grand, grueling, expensive, and occasionally vicious, "extreme" 365-day marathon of birdwatching. For three men in particular, 1998 would be a whirlwind, a winner-takes-nothing battle for a new North American birding record.

Babe Ruth was more than baseball's original superstar. For 85 years, he has remained the sport's reigning titan. He has been named Athlete of the Century...more than once. But who was this large, loud, enigmatic man? In The Big Bam, Leigh Montville brings his trademark touch to this groundbreaking, revelatory portrait of the Babe.

Literate, honest, and deeply observant, Faithful Travelers is a beautiful meditation on the bond between parent and child and the nature of love and loss. Dodson proves that sometimes life isn't what happens while you're waiting to go fishing; sometimes it happens while you're there.

Bill Strickland believed he was cursed. No matter how secure his life outwardly seemed, the happiness he had attained with his wife and daughter hung by a thread, threatened by the monster Bill lived in constant fear of, a demon inside him that had been created by horrific childhood abuse.

For 18 years Ed Viesturs pursued climbing's holy grail: to stand atop the world's 14 8,000-meter peaks, without the aid of bottled oxygen. But No Shortcuts to the Top is as much about the man who would become the first American to achieve that goal as it is about his stunning quest. As Viesturs recounts the stories of his most harrowing climbs, he reveals a man torn between the flat, safe world he and his loved ones share and the majestic and deadly places where only he can go.

In the life of every sports fan, there comes a moment of reckoning. It may happen when your team wins on a last-second field goal and you suddenly find yourself clenched in a loving embrace with a large hairy man you've never met. Or in the long, hormonally depleted days after a loss, when you're felled by a sensation similar to the one you first experienced following the death of a pet.

In Knowledge in a Nutshell, you'll find out about the U.S. state that no longer exists; why hamburgers are called hamburgers, even though there's no ham in them; who was the youngest U.S. President (it wasn't John F. Kennedy); what were the biggest animals who ever lived (it wasn't the dinosaurs), and much more.

Sasha Chapin is a victim of chess. Like countless amateurs before him - Albert Einstein, Humphrey Bogart, Marcel Duchamp - the game has consumed his life and his mind. First captivated by it as a member of his high school chess club, his passion was rekindled during an accidental encounter with chess hustlers on the streets of Kathmandu. In its aftermath, he forgot how to care about anything else. He played at all hours, for weeks at a time. Like a spurned lover, he tried to move on, but he found the game more seductive the more he resisted it.

In 1856 Paul Du Chaillu marched into the equatorial wilderness of West Africa determined to bag an animal that, according to legend, was nothing short of a monster. When he emerged three years later, the summation of his efforts only hinted at what he'd experienced in one of the most dangerous regions on earth. Armed with an astonishing collection of zoological specimens, Du Chaillu leapt from the physical challenges of the jungle straight into the center of the biggest issues of the time.

Dan Rooney was one of the most influential sports executives of his generation, the man who transformed the Pittsburgh Steelers into one of the National Football League's great dynasties and premiere franchises. In this poignant account of his father's life, Jim Rooney takes listeners behind the scenes to share stories from his hundreds of hours of interviews with business and political leaders; sports and celebrity influencers; and family members. A Different Way to Win underscores the importance of focusing on the long game and building consensus in a way that is meaningful.

If you've ever wondered what it's like to be struck by lightning, swallowed by quicksand, or stung by a jellyfish, then fasten your seatbelt and get ready for a wild ride. Full of harrowing adventure and surprising scientific insights, Extreme Encounters offers blow-by-blow accounts of life's most dangerous experiences in thrilling "you-are-there" narrative.

In 2009, former manager of the St. Louis Cardinals Mike Matheny penned a strongly worded letter urging parents and coaches to view youth baseball not as a stepping stone to the Major Leagues, but as a guide to teaching children discipline, the value of hard work, and the virtue of humility. That letter quickly went viral and became the basis of the New York Times bestseller, The Matheny Manifesto. Now, in The Dad Coach, Matheny puts his philosophy in action and provides a template for coaches and parents to develop solid fundamentals and a strong sense of character in their players.

"Watch this little guy," Pete Hamill's dad tells him. The little guy is Eddie Stanky, an ex-soccer player who bounced around the minor leagues until getting a call to the majors. It's 1944, and a young Pete Hamill is with his father watching the Brooklyn Dodgers play the Boston Braves. Hamill's memories of that game and his dad make an appealing story for baseball fans and anyone who has rooted for the underdog.

This classic essay from Jon Krakauer is now available as an unabridged audiobook download. This essay is also included in the Classic Krakauer collection. From the best-selling author of Missoula and Into the Wild: a selection of the singular investigative journalism that made Krakauer famous, covering topics from avalanches on Mt. Everest to a volcano in Washington state; from a wilderness therapy program for teens to an extraordinary cave in New Mexico so unearthly that is used by NASA to better understand Mars.

Pep Guardiolas jahrelange Arbeit beim FC Barcelona, erst als Spieler, dann als Trainer, war eine Erfolgsgeschichte der Superlative: 2009 - nach einigen titellosen Jahren - erreichte der FC Barcelona das bisher nie dagewesene Sextuple, d.h. den Gewinn aller bedeutenden nationalen und internationalen Titel im gleichen Jahr .

Libraries and Internet sites are filled to groaning with debates about who the best ballplayers of all time were - but how many times can you argue about Mantle vs. Mays? Since baseball is a game of failure, it's much more fun to dive into the fray and explore baseball's worst: Who was the lousiest pitcher of all-time? The biggest goat? The most despicable owner? The greatest cheater? Filip Bondy wields formidable research, advanced sabermetrics and his considerable wit to provide this indispensable guide.

At the age of 22, Ben Davis weighed over 360 pounds. Depressed, addicted to food, and morbidly obese, he thought he’d lost all hope. But after a Christmas Eve conversation with his grandmother, Ben promised himself that he would finally take control of his life.

In the tradition of Uzodinma Iweala's Beasts of No Nation by way of Christopher McDougall's Born to Run, this is the inspirational true story of the Ugandan boy soldier who became a world-renowned runner, then found his calling as director of a world-renowned African children's charity.

On the night of March 2, 1962, in Hershey, Pennsylvania, right up the street from the chocolate factory, Wilt Chamberlain, a young and striking athlete celebrated as the Big Dipper, scored 100 points in a game against the New York Knickerbockers. As historic and revolutionary as the achievement was, it remains shrouded in myth. The game was not televised; no New York sportswriters showed up; and a 14-year-old local boy ran onto the court when Chamberlain scored his hundredth point, shook his hand, and then ran off with the basketball.

On the morning of 12 August 2022, Salman Rushdie was standing onstage at the Chautauqua Institution in upstate New York, preparing to give a lecture on the importance of keeping writers safe from harm, when a man in black–black clothes, black mask–rushed down the aisle towards him, wielding a knife. His first thought: So it’s you. Here you are. What followed was a horrific act of violence that shook the literary world and beyond.